abandonware games sorted by popularity

Hardball! is where the series begins, and it carries the slightly rough charm of a pioneer finding its footing. The mechanics are simple, but they establish a foundation that futur...

DuckTales: The Quest for Gold takes everyone’s favorite miserly duck, Scrooge McDuck, and sends him globetrotting for treasure. It’s part platformer, part management si...

Math was never supposed to be this exciting. In Number Munchers, you’re a green blob with an appetite for multiplication tables, gobbling up correct answers while dodging &ld...

Rockford: The Arcade Game is a 1987 DOS adaptation of the classic Boulder Dash-style character, combining maze navigation, treasure collecting, falling rocks, and dangerous creatur...

The Three Stooges brings the chaotic comedy of Moe, Larry and Curly to the computer in a collection of slapstick challenges that are much more interested in laughs than dignity. Th...

Yes, it’s that Beethoven—the slobbery St. Bernard, not the piano guy. In Beethoven 2, you control a surprisingly agile dog on a quest to rescue your kidnapped puppies. ...

Thexder 2: Firehawk expands the original transforming-robot formula with larger environments, new enemies and a greater emphasis on combat. The basic trick remains wonderfully simp...

If you’ve ever wondered what it’s like to be a criminal economist in 1980s New York, Drug Wars has your fix—pun intended. This early DOS classic throws you into t...

Celtic Tales (1995) throws you into the misty, myth-soaked hills of ancient Ireland, where diplomacy is just war with more steps. You’re a clan leader trying to outwit druids...

Football fans eager to relive one of Manchester United's greatest achievements found plenty to enjoy in Manchester United: The Double. Combining management elements with on-pitch a...

In Allan Border’s Cricket (1993), you get to live the thrill of... waiting. A lot. But when the action kicks in, it’s surprisingly engaging. Named after the Australian ...

Released in 1990, Air Strike USA is what you'd get if Top Gun had a baby with a Saturday morning cartoon. You pilot a heavily armed jet through side-scrolling skies, shooting down ...

International Soccer Challenge in 1990 continues the tradition of digital football with a more competitive edge. The pacing is brisk, the mechanics approachable, and the matches of...

Step aside, arcade action—B-24 Combat Simulator (1987) is here to test your patience, eyesight, and possibly your sanity. It’s all about realism, baby. You’ll tak...

For those who got hopelessly addicted to the card game inside Final Fantasy VIII, Triple Triad Gold (2000) was like someone saying, “Here, now you can ruin your productivity ...

Plague of the Moon is a 1994 DOS adventure game that combines mystery, exploration, and supernatural themes in a dark fantasy setting. Players investigate strange events while unco...

Jazz Jackrabbit Holiday Hare takes the fast-paced action of the original game and wraps it in festive cheer. Released in 1994 as a seasonal special, it sends Jazz through winter-th...

Gremlins 2: The New Batch leans into the chaos of its source material and then adds a layer of video game unpredictability on top. In Gremlins 2, you deal with enemies that are as ...

Hardball 3 builds on its predecessor with a noticeable sense of confidence, as if it knows it has already proven itself and now wants to show off a little. The graphics are improve...

TV Sports Baseball from 1991 tries to bottle the magic of America’s pastime and pour it into your DOS machine, complete with commentary and a surprising amount of personality. Th...

In Conflict: Europe, the Cold War goes hot, and you’re in charge of keeping things cool—or launching World War III. It’s a strategy game with a doomsday timer, wh...

Twilight 2000 drops you into a grim alternate future where global conflict has gone spectacularly wrong, and survival is less about heroics and more about scraping by. Released in ...

Ballistix asks: “What if air hockey was controlled by futuristic cannons?” The answer: chaos. You frantically shoot pucks with directional blasts while the physics engi...

If you've ever stared at a camel and thought, "What if it shot lasers and had a personal grudge against humanity?", Attack of the Mutant Camels is the fever dream you've been waiti...

Lancelot (1988) is an action-adventure that draws loosely from Arthurian legend and very tightly from the difficulty school of “good luck.” You guide the famous knight ...

Guldkorn Expressen sounds cheerful, and in many ways it is—a Scandinavian oddity that feels like it was assembled with equal parts whimsy and educational intent. You guide a ...

The Usurper is a fantasy action game built around the classic computer-game recipe of dangerous dungeons, hostile creatures and a hero who apparently has nothing better to do than ...

Vampyr: Talisman of Invocation is an obscure fantasy adventure built around exploration, combat, and the hunt for magical objects. The setting has all the ingredients you might exp...

Fallout 2 takes everything that worked in the original and gleefully pushes it further, louder, and weirder. Released in 1998, it expands the world, the humor, and the sheer number...

In a world where fish can apparently become cybernetic superheroes, James Pond 2: Codename: RoboCod makes perfect sense. Released for DOS in 1993, this platformer stars the aquatic...